Cake and Frosting
by Riyazura
Summary: A Gravity Falls one-shot. Upon the aftermath of a sudden argument over what should have been a good-natured conversation, Wendy unexpectedly explains to the Pines twins the real importance of trusting family.


_For reference, this one-shot takes place in the middle of season 1. I h__ope you enjoy this one-shot, and thank you for reading!_

* * *

Mabel secretly held a plate of many colorfully-varied cupcakes behind her back with utmost caution as she strutted towards the gift shop's counter. That was where her brother, Dipper, and their friend Wendy were standing behind the empty room's cashier desk, talking in carefree tones about carefree matters.

She knew they had no customers to contend to. With that in mind, this should be a good opportunity to give them each something of her creation. She'd worked on the effort all morning, and she couldn't wait to see their elated reactions... Well, _Wendy's,_ at least. Dipper probably wouldn't care any more than he usually did—which wasn't too much—but still.

"Heyo!" she greeted the two. "Since Grunkle Stan gave me the day off to give me time to help fix up the shack, I decided I would use my morning _well._ Guess what I made for you two _love birds."_

She whispered _love birds_ only into Dipper's ear, but he gave her an annoyed side eye anyway.

"I'm just messin' with ya!" She beamed at him with a toothy white grin adorned with braces, and revealed the cupcakes in front of them. "Dah dah dah _daaah!_ I made all of us extra sparkly cupcakes de-_luxe,_ with extra sparkles!"

"Extra sparkly cupcakes with extra sparkles," Wendy repeated with a smirk that also did not look surprised. "That sounds just like you, Mabel."

The sweater-obsessed girl blushed appreciatively. "Oh, I know," she shrugged. "Pick one! There's more where this came from! Or—Well, I didn't make that many; I handed the others out to Soos, Grunkle Stan, and Grenda and Candy, but I left these ones for you guys."

"Hey, it's cool. Say, these cupcakes have quite a bit of... Is this sugar or _glitter?_ They're a bit top-heavy." Wendy admitted frankly.

Dipper added to Wendy, "Yeah... I'm surprised you didn't guess that Mabel really likes to find any excuse to add more sugar in her diet." He gingerly picked up an orange cupcake with a dollop of red frosting and too many yellow sprinkles.

"You're missing the other point, Dipper. The other reason why I gifted these delectable treats with so much _handsomely_ sweet frosting is because they deserve—"

"_Kaughck!_—this frosting is too sweet, Mabel."

"You didn't let me finish, Dip Dop!" The girl spoke with indignance, but then she closed her eyes. "They deserve to be given character and compassion. They must be remembered, in their goodness or their badness, in the brief time that they exist, brother."

"Ohhh_-kay,_ sister." Dipper responded nonchalantly. "But really; this batch of cupcakes probably had one cup of sugar too many."

"Hey, I'm not so bothered by these cupcakes, aesthetically speaking," Wendy admitted. "I needed this today. Everyone in my life has been getting to me recently—Robbie, my brothers, my dad. . . This cupcake was all I needed to power through the day, Mabel."

"Aww, thanks, Wendy! That's all I need to hear to know that my mission has been successful!"

The girl with coffee-colored hair saluted to no one in particular. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I must go fix the kitchen doorknob!" Mabel skipped away enthusiastically as she made her way to the kitchen, her cupcake tray tucked beneath her arm. Her black leather shoes clicked and clacked against the hardwood floors before the shutting of a door could be heard.

Dipper smiled. He unwrapped the festive treat, fire-colored frosting sticking to his fingers.

"Y'know," he began, "the best part about Mabel is that she tries to please anyone and everyone around her. I'm pretty sure the reason why she has to fix the lock in the kitchen door is because she tried to please Grunkle Stan in learning how to lockpick. I guess I'm lucky to have such a considerate twin sister, even if that sometimes gets her in trouble by accident..."

"And you're lucky you have a sister that you get along with, man!" Wendy took a delicate bite out of her blue, green, and pink cupcake. "My brothers try to find any and every chance to annoy me."

"But surely they've done something you appreciate? Th—they can't be _all_ bad, right?"

Wendy chuckled. "I don't like to admit it, but that's true. One time, the three of my brothers decided to make our dad and I a cake. This was for one of those lumberjack contests I told you about, since I won first place."

Dipper stared admiringly as Wendy continued, "But the thing is that they didn't have the ingredients to make any frosting to go with it. It was a miracle they even bothered to make _any_ food for us, but still, it was a chocolate cake with no frosting. It tasted good though, and that was one of the only times we actually talked at the dinner table. Normally we just eat in our separate places of the house, going back to what we were doing before we grabbed our food from the kitchen..."

"It makes me a little sad, to be honest." Wendy mumbled, a mere ghost of her smile remaining. "That was a nice night. It was actually a pretty good slice of chocolate cake, even without frosting."

Dipper's gaze sparked with attentiveness. "Okay, now that you say that—Well, this might be taking the conversation off-topic, so I'm sorry—but I have a random question. So, I kind of have a thing—like, an opinion about what kind of foods go together, and what doesn't. And," he explained nervously, "Do you think that cake and frosting go together?"

"Uh..." Wendy said blatantly, "I think they go great together."

"Oh. I mean, _I_ think that cake and frosting don't go together. I hate cake and frosting when they're combined. I can't take the sore, scratchy feeling frosting gives your throat when you eat too much of it, it's just... _Ugh."_

"_THIS IS A CRIME!"_

When Dipper heard the obnoxious scream from the other side of the kitchen door, he let out an unplanned yelp and dropped his cupcake back to the counter.

Mabel had burst through the kitchen door, fury visible through the narrowing of her eyes and clenched fists. "Dipper, how could you _say_ that?!" She dashed right into him, them both crashing into the floor.

Dipper was vaguely aware of the fact that Wendy watched at the sidelines awkwardly, not having expected Mabel's sudden uproar. Her hand balled into a fist, a strained, near-white color...

"What're you doing!? How did you even hear what I said?" Dipper protested, his focus on Mabel once more.

Mabel shrugged on top of him, pretending to be casual. "I was fixing the lock on the door because I accidentally snapped a part inside it."

Dipper tried to push her hands off of his shoulders, but ultimately failed, so he continued as naturally as he could in asking her his question: "Wait, so Grunkle Stan was teaching you to pick locks again? That's why you said you had to fix the doorknob?"

"_Maybe_—I mean, I was actually practicing on my own this time—_but that's not important!_ It's like you _lied_ to me about liking my cupcakes that I took so long to make look amazing!"

"I never said I hated them! I li—"

"You've never appreciated what I've done for you!"

"After all the things you've done for _me?_ You humiliated me at the diner in front of a crowd, you poked fun at me in front of Soos and Grunkle Stan, and you made us go back in time so you could get Waddles, which _also_ made me lose the single outcome where I could have been able to impress W—"

"I think you two should stop _bickering_ over some ridiculous acts of childishness," Wendy demanded crossly, "seeing as you two aren't the ones with three younger brothers who don't do a _lick_ of work to help you out when life gets tough! _Seriously,_ kids don't understand what sibling rivalry is _truly_ like, do they?" she hissed to herself, rolling her eyes as she paced loudly away from them.

Dipper only managed to croak out an 'um' before Wendy had stormed out of the door to the kitchen. Then when he got to his feet—Mabel giving him a hand willingly—"Did," she whispered in his ear, "did we set Wendy off?"

She had eased herself off of Dipper silently when he whispered back, "She didn't seem angry at all before... y—you came in. She wasn't even making her situation at home out to be _that _rough."

The sweater-donning girl gave her brother a wire-filled grimace. "Maybe we should follow her and say sorry for being rude."

"Or give her some time to think things through?" Dipper instead offered. "We don't know _what_ got Wendy so riled up all of a sudden..."

Mabel 'hmph'ed cluelessly. "Okay."

The two resided to standing behind the cashier desk. They were both still painfully alone in the gift shop, with nothing to appease their thoughts. No out-loud contemplations of whether to buy a puma shirt or a panther shirt, no second-guessing as to whether a snow globe was really worth two hundred dollars, but especially no friendly banter shared by fellow employees...

"I wonder when Wendy will come back in, or if she'll stay angry with us," Dipper admitted, putting an elbow on the counter forlornly and resting his cheek against his hand. He made a conscious effort to not look at the two abandoned cupcakes—his and Wendy's—next to him.

Mabel laughed listlessly, mirth missing from her chocolate-brown eyes. "We really messed up, didn't we?"

Dipper cocked his head, but promptly thought better, covering his face in the crook of his arm against the counter's woodwork. "I guess now is the time for us to formulate an apology."

"Hey, uh, Dip Dop... Sorry I've been so unappreciative of you all this time."

"Huh?" He directed his gaze to her from under the shade of his pine tree cap. Then he joked, "I meant that we should apologize to _Wendy,_ n—not _you_ to _me—_

_"No,"_ Mabel said exasperatedly, "I know that. But I want to say sorry to you before we apologize to Wendy anyway. I really haven't put in the time to appreciate having you by my side while we've stayed here in Gravity Falls. If anything, I've been_ unappreciative."_

"Whaaat? You gave me a cupcake you made earlier today. How is that unappreciative?"

"Don't deny what you told me when I pinned you down, Dipper! You're right to be angry when you say I humiliated you, and when I poked fun at you, and when I manipulated you to go back in time to get Waddles for me... not to mention, yeah. I made you lose your chances of getting Wendy to notice you. You're right to be angry because those things are _true._ I admit it, I did those things to you."

Mabel hadn't been looking at Dipper as he stared at her. Her head was tipped down in shame as she bared her mistakes, brunette wisps of hair she hadn't bothered to push away from her face falling over her closed lashes.

"I'm... I'm sorry too," Dipper began, looking away. "I was honest when saying I liked the treats you gave Wendy and me, but it was selfish of me to point out all of the things you've done wrong after that. I refused to give credit to what you've done _right. _You're right on what you said you've done wrong, I'm not gonna deny that. But I appreciate the good things you've done for me too." Dipper unfolded his hand, beginning to count with his fingers; Mabel was watching silently. "Like saving us from the gnome monster, Gideon, and keeping Waddles, and for this cupcake..." He offered his sister a smile. "I appreciate all of it, Mabel."

The girl returned the smile with obvious gratitude. "Thank you, Dipper. Now let's go apologize to Wendy."

The Pines twins wandered through the kitchen and outside to the porch to see that Wendy was perched on one of the steps facing away from them, gloomily slouching forward.

When the two siblings came to perch down next to her, they saw that she was resting her forehead against a palm. _Hopefully not from annoyance._ Dipper suppressed a cringe.

"Hey, Wendy," Dipper greeted.

He and Mabel were met purely by silence.

"Um," he continued, "sorry we were acting so immature in front of you. It was probably not a good reminder of your own life at home, considering your own siblings."

"We'll make sure we don't act up like that again," Mabel added.

Wendy's unruly, fiery hair still obscured her gaze. She was staring ever forward. "It's..." she shrugged. "It's fine. It's just that it's getting to be that time of the year again. My mom passed away around this time a few years back. That's what really got me triggered. I'm not angry at you two, not anymore."

_Not anymore. _Dipper and Mabel exchanged uncertain glances as Dipper intertwined his fingers, desperate for solace_—_neither of them were sure what to say in reply to this revelation. It wasn't what they had expected at all, and it most certainly wasn't something they could lend comfort to.

"My dad and brothers are all becoming divisive because of it when we get near each other at home, and I'm just... kind of caught in the middle. I want to maybe talk to them, about us as a_ family,_ visiting my mom. Talk things through with _each_ _other_ about how we all feel terrible whenever it gets to be the anniversary again. It was only three years ago..." Wendy repeated to herself weakly, bringing her hands together. Then she turned her gaze to the twins. It was newly hardened like the steel of a sawblade.

"Do me a favor, you two. Promise me you'll both stick together, no matter whatever messed up things happen to you both. That's something my brothers and I never managed to do, and now we're paying the price."

Mabel was the first to nod fervently, offering a meek smile. "We'll do that!"

Dipper quickly followed suit. "No matter what, Wendy. We'll do that for you."

Wendy's dark, half-closed gaze brightened some, and she sighed—not out of disappointment this time, but in contentment. "Thanks. I hope you both have apologized to each other, then."

The twins affirmed that they did. "By the way..." Dipper added, "Wendy? I think you can still sort things out with your brothers and father."

"Oh, I know for certain that I can do that; don't worry 'bout it, Dipper. It might take an unfrosted chocolate cake offering to them, but I'll make it work." Wendy lent the two a reassuring smile, one with so much tranquility Dipper thought he had never seen from the teen before.

"Hey," Wendy added, "you know what?"

"What?" Mabel's chocolate eyes were round with curiosity.

"Y'know, a cake without frosting is like the world having no color. You've only got so much to look at in a world that's just black and white, but it is so much _more_ if it has color. When cake doesn't have frosting, you've only got half of the equation. But you two, you two make up the equation, cake and frosting—you two_ are_ the pair."

Dipper parsed a lip as he adjusted his cap. "And which of us is which?"

"Isn't that obvious?" Mabel snickered. "You're the cake, because I'm too glittery to not be the frosting, dumbo!"

"Don't 'dumbo' me, dumbo!" Dipper gave Mabel a joking, siblingly push on the shoulder. "Who puts glitter on their cupcakes?"

"Dipper's right on that one!" Wendy genuinely grinned for the first time since she had originally walked out to the porch.

The boy thought for a moment. "Wait—does that mean you _did_ put glitter on top of our cupcakes today?"

_"Ahm—"_

Wendy hadn't let Mabel complete her hesitant response when she mused, "Hmm." The teenager had taken a distracted glance at the pale blue skies, swiftly turning lavender. Its edge was spiked by darkening jagged peaks and pine trees. The sun floated just between the sky and them, making the trees' shadows stretch out onto the grass and pebbles dotting the rich brown earth in front of the porch.

"The sun's gotten pretty low in the sky. Let's go back in to the gift shop before Stan hollers at us for missing closing time, my dudes. Deal?"

Wendy lifted her hand into a fist, awaiting a fistpump from Dipper along with an encouraging simper.

"Deal." Dipper's display of happiness reached his eyes, unmarred by shame. It's a good thing Wendy had been so accepting of their apology. He'd never heard her so speak so bluntly before. He had a feeling it was good that she trusted them so much.

The glance he stole at Mabel showed him that she was just as happy when Wendy gave her her own fistpump.

"Hey, Mabel," the boy murmured in his sister's ear as they rose to walk back to their place in the gift shop, "when we get back in, would you like one half of my cupcake?"

His sister's smile was rather graceful despite the goofiness of her braces. Perhaps the genuineness of it was what made Dipper think so.

"I didn't save a cupcake for myself, so yeah. I would appreciate that, bro-bro."

In that moment, Dipper didn't think he'd ever given Mabel a wider, more appreciative smile in his life. _You really are too considerate for your own good, Mabel._

_Wendy, I promise. We both will stick together, no matter whatever messed up things try to separate us._


End file.
